In the weeks since the night he'd come home and cried on her, Gold had been acting even more erratic than usual, and Lacey was becoming concerned. She was used to him acting unusually, but the behaviors that had been worrying her before were just magnified now. He was in turns distant and needy, fussing over her health and safety without being willing to touch her. He'd vanish for hours and then come home and lurk at her elbow as she did everything from eating dinner to brushing her teeth. He hadn't repeated the curling up beside her thing since that first night, but otherwise he was acting really strange, and Lacey was on edge. Something wasn't right, and she wasn't sure what it was.
She hadn't left the house much the last few days; he was starting to call her at random times during the day to make sure she was okay and it was making her nervous. He wanted to know where she was and who she was with, and the worst part was that it didn't feel like how guys got when they were trying to control you – the relief in his voice whenever she answered him was palpable. She was pretty sure that he was legitimately worried about something, he just wouldn't tell her what. If it wasn't phone calls, it was bizarre questions.
"Do you remember when we first met?" he said one day as she stood at the vanity brushing her hair.
"Of course," she replied, not really understanding the purpose of the question. He'd never been one to reminisce, and neither of them had ever really romanticized their relationship. "I dropped a glass of water on you for being a jerk."
"What were you wearing?"
"A very short skirt," she said cheekily, going back to brushing her hair.
"What else?" he pressed. "What did your hair look like?"
"I don't know," she replied honestly. "You can't expect me to remember every little thing like that. I only remember the skirt because you kept staring."
She tried to lighten the mood by swatting him playfully on the arm, but he remained oddly somber, as though he were cross-examining her on the witness stand and not asking her about these silly memories.
"What about when you moved in?" he pushed.
"I don't remember what I was wearing then," she teased, turning around to face him. "There were other parts that were a lot more interesting."
"How long ago was it?"
"I don't know," she replied, trying to think. "A couple years I guess, I don't really think about it much. Why?"
"I remember," he insisted. "I was on my way home from the shop late that night and I saw you in a fight with your ex on the street, remember?"
She nodded slowly, a little afraid of how intense he had gotten all of a sudden. Of course she remembered that, he'd saved her. She wasn't likely to forget. He was scaring her now, though, and she'd gotten out of the habit of being afraid. She began counting footsteps between herself, the bedroom door and the bathroom door trying to determine which would be the quickest exit. She was a little closer to the bedroom door, but he was partially in her path. Bathroom it was, then.
"I was staying late that night because Regina needed help finding a child," he continued. "The next morning I got a phone call and had to leave you for a little while because Henry was available. Don't you remember?"
"Henry is ten years old," she replied softly, edging away from him and towards the bathroom. "I haven't been living here ten years."
"We ran into her a few days later," he said. "Outside the diner. She left us alone after I told her I'd found him."
"You're confused," she blurted out, even though what he said sounded familiar. "I would have been in high school then. It wasn't ten years ago, it can't have been ten years ago."
"Think about it, Lacey," he pleaded with her. "Don't you remember?"
He reached out for her and she yelped and jumped backward. His entire face crumbled miserably at that, and he pulled away from her completely. Her head was starting to hurt a little bit and she could feel herself becoming more and more agitated the more she thought about what he was saying.
"Why are you asking me these things?" she demanded. "They're lies."
"I met you in 1983," he said quietly. "You were wearing an off the shoulder sweater and your hair was so big I wasn't sure you should be around open flames."
"Shut up," she cried.
"I gave you a twenty dollar tip the next day, which about what you usually made in a full day of work."
"Stop it!"
"You were listening to Billy Idol on a cassette player," he continued, walking towards her as though he were approaching a rattlesnake. "I caught you when you tripped. Do you remember that?"
She remembered falling, she remembered she'd been listening to music, but it couldn't have been on a Walkman, because she hadn't had one of those since she was a little girl. She backed away from him as he approached her, edging her way closer to the bathroom.
"Lacey, please," he begged. "Your father called the florist MelROSE Place in the mid-90s. You used to make me watch the damn show every week. Do you remember?"
"No," she sobbed a little, tears beginning to well up in her eyes. "Stop, please. I don't remember."
He looked a little stricken, but he didn't stop.
"I took you to see Titanic in theater," he whispered. "And you were obsessed with it for three months afterward. I bought you a reproduction of the necklace that Christmas."
She had that necklace. She'd seen it just a few months ago when she'd been preparing to leave. How did she have something like that? The movie had come out when she was thirteen. She hadn't even known Gold yet, she'd only ever seen him on the street.
"You're lying," she finally forced out. "That can't be true."
She dashed the last few steps to the bathroom, locking the door behind her and curling up on the floor to cry. She heard him calling her name through the door but didn't answer him. She didn't know why she was so upset, she only knew that this couldn't be true. It just couldn't.
By the time she finally emerged, he was gone. She wasn't sure where he was, but she couldn't face him anyway. He didn't come to bed, either, and when she saw him the next morning he didn't bring it up again. She didn't know what she'd have done if he had.
"Can you do me a favor?" he asked as he set down a mug of coffee on the counter. "I need you to stay home today."
"Why?" she replied. It wasn't that she made a habit of going out lately, but he'd never flat out asked her not to before, either.
"Something big is going to happen today," he explained. "And I'd feel better if you stayed home."
"What do you mean 'something big' is going to happen?" she said as calmly as she could manage. "That sounds really fucking scary, Gold."
"Regina got out on bail," he replied. "I don't know what's going to happen, but it's going to be big. I need you to stay home."
"Alright," she replied slowly. "If it's that important, I'll stay home."
He nodded, and rinsed out his mug, lingering over the sink for a while without looking at her. She watched his hands clench on the counter for a little while before he finally stood up and turned to face her.
"Oh Lacey," he said, reaching out and cupping her cheek in his hand. "I'm so, so sorry. You have to know that I didn't mean for any of this to happen at all."
"I don't understand," she replied.
"It'll all make sense soon," he promised. "When it's over, I just want you to know that you can keep the house. It's yours. I won't bother you again."
"Gold," she whimpered. "You're scaring me."
"I'm sorry," he replied, leaning in and kissing her on the forehead. "You'll be safe, that's the important thing to remember. You and the baby will both be safe."
He left while she was still trying to put together a coherent thought. Her mind was racing and she was very, very scared. Gold was up to something, and for the first time in her life with him, she was afraid. He'd never scared her either intentionally or accidentally in the time she'd known him. She heard him start the car and suddenly she was overcome with the urge to bolt all the doors and windows. He had a key and it wouldn't keep him out, but she didn't think Gold meant her any particular harm.
It didn't take too long to bolt the doors, and once she was sure she was locked safely inside the big house, she went to his library and began digging through the drawers on his desk until she found the locked box he kept his handgun in. The key was under a paperweight and she let herself into it, breathing a sigh of relief when she saw the gun still safely in its home. At least, whatever he had planned, he hadn't taken the gun with him to do it.
That didn't mean he wasn't planning a shooting spree, but it did at least mean he was very limited in where he needed to go to begin it and it maybe gave her some time to alert somebody that she thought he might be...what, exactly? She didn't know what was wrong, but she knew she had to tell somebody.
She wasn't able to reach the sheriff to ask her to look in on Gold (it went against everything in her to summon the woman she was pretty sure Gold had been after to go find him, but Emma Swan at least had a gun if Lacey's fears turned out to be correct). She'd tried the emergency line, she'd tried calling the station directly...hell, she'd tried calling information and getting Emma Swan's personal line, but nobody had answered at all. Lacey felt like she was going crazy locked up in the house, but he'd been so adamant that she stay there she didn't dare to leave. She had no doubt something dangerous was happening, she just wished she knew what that was.
She left the TV on all day, hoping for some news of the outside, some idea of what was going on, but as the hours ticked by she got nothing but agitated.
It finally occurred to her to call Ruby. Ruby used to work for the sheriff and she was at the diner all day talking to people. If anyone would know what was going on, it was Ruby. Lacey dialed and was rewarded with her friend's voice.
"Granny's Diner, Ruby speaking."
"Ruby," Lacey exclaimed. "It's Lacey. I'm so glad to hear you, something's going on in town and I don't know what."
"You haven't heard?" Ruby replied. "It's awful. Henry Mills is in a coma, they're not sure if he's going to pull through or not."
"What?!"
"Yeah, nobody knows exactly what happened but Emma and the mayor have been together all day."
"Do you think..." Lacey could barely ask the question, but she had to know. "Do you think somebody hurt him? On purpose?"
"I don't know," Ruby replied. "Maybe. I heard something about poison, but it's hard to say what's rumor and what's not, ya know?"
Lacey felt a chill run up her spine. Was this was Gold had warned her about? That he was going to harm Henry Mills? He'd been interrogating her about the boy's birth, after all. She really hoped it was just a coincidence, but somehow she just didn't know.
"Hey I gotta go," Ruby said quickly. "Some customers just came in. I'll see you around, okay?"
"Yeah," Lacey replied, knowing her voice didn't quite hit the right tone to be casual. "I'll see you soon."
She was pretty sure she'd be sick. If he'd hurt the boy...but he'd promised her that their child would be safe. He'd promised that she'd be safe. But now there was a little boy in town who was lying in a hospital bed while his mother hoped he would be alright.
She couldn't breathe for a second, like having the wind knocked from her chest. Memories were rushing through her so fast she could hardly grab onto any of them – her father, her mother, her childhood...and Rumpelstiltskin. She was Lady Belle of Avonlea, she was carrying Rumpelstiltskin's child, and she had to see him.